Spring is getting closer!

 
 
 
 

Claire's First Ice Skating Lesson

 
 
 
 

Ice Skating Fun.

 
 
 
 

...just Reid.

 

Winter Fun!

 

Wedding Crashers

Claire and Hayden were the flower girl and ring bearer in my cousin's wedding this weekend. Claire had been prepping for the event for weeks. She practiced with Barbies, watched You Tube videos of flower girls, and we held several mock weddings in the yard. The morning of the wedding, she woke up at 5 a.m. and said, "Is it time to put my dress on?" She had the time of her life and is already looking forward to her next wedding.

Hayden wasn't quite as enthusiastic as Claire (to be fair, no one was as enthusiastic as Claire), but he did his job, looked adorable, and probably consumed about 5 lbs. of candy, so it might well have been the happiest day of his life.

The dapper duo
 
The whole family
 
Not sure what Hayden is doing, but that boy has some impressive moves
 
Claire with Mr. & Mrs. Brawn
 

Happy Birthday, Hayden!

...and thanks again for being born on the 7th rather than the 8th. I really didn't want to have a Thomas the Train birthday party this year.

This was the first year that Hayden really understood what a birthday is. He woke up at about 11 o'clock the night before, wandered downstairs, and said, "Is it time to blow out my candles?" He had a small party with a few of his friends on Friday, followed by more presents than any one child needs. Sounds like a good day to me!

 

Fishin' (whistle the Andy Griffith theme here)

Grumps and Hayden patiently settle in for their first bite.
 
And two minutes later...Hayden's first fish! Hours later, he was already telling fish stories like he'd caught some kind of trophy fish.
 
Claire and Papa came so close to catching a fish, but the fish bailed on them. Surely Hayden throwing sticks and rocks into the water had nothing to do with that.
 
Reid thought the whole experience was exhilirating.
 

Reid's first haircut

He turned into a big boy in like 5 minutes flat. Waaaahhh.

Before
 
During
 
Well? How do we look?
 
Ta-da!
 

Fourth of July

We took Claire and Hayden to their first fireworks show this year. The show we went to announces each state and then shoots off a canon. "Alabama....BOOM! Arkansas...BOOM!" That's 50 ridiculously loud canon blasts, and we were a worried how Hayden would deal with it. After the first blast he looked a bit surprised and then a slow smile spread across his face and he yelled, "Boom!" He got more into it with each blast, often throwing his fists in the air and yelling, "Boom!" He's afraid of the dark, but you can shoot a canon off next to his head and it won't faze him in the least.

The best photo I could get of the matching outfits Baba got them.
 
 
 
 
I took this just as the first fireworks went off. I love her expression.
 
And because I love this picture...here's Claire four years earlier.
 

Claire Bear turns 5!

We celebrated Claire's birthday in Kansas this year with some of our old friends and their kids. It was supposed to be a swimming party, but the kids had to settle for ransacking Baba and Grumps' house because the weather was unseasonably cold. July in Kansas...go figure. Claire had a great time and has a whole fleet of new Barbies and Polly Pockets. We celebrated her birthday at home before we left so we didn't have to haul her loot with us, and she decided that multiple days of presents was a pretty good idea. She's going to be like Mommy, and celebrate her birthday for an entire week. Smart kid.

Future musical genius
 
Check out her expression. Cinderella = pure joy
 
Pink helmet, pink dress, pink shoes, pink scooter. Can you tell she loves pink??
 
Five candles ((sigh))...such a big girl.
 

Tall Ships

So Lauren and the kiddos are spending an extra week in Kansas City...all of sudden I have a lot of time to myself (an unintended valuable gift from my sweet wife). It has been a rare beautiful day so I decided to walk over after work to check out the Tall Ships that are in town for the weekend. I saw them coming into port on Thursday (didn't have a camera) and they are even more breath taking with all of their sails out. Check out facebook if you want to see more.